DPWH officials face graft raps

MANILA, Philippines—Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales has ordered graft charges filed against a dismissed regional director of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) for the payment of P2.5 million for an allegedly spurious road right-of-way claim back in 2001.

Former DPWH Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) acting regional director Antonio Purugganan will face criminal and administrative charges along with six current DPWH Cordillera officials and three others who processed the questioned transaction.

They will be charged with two counts of malversation through falsification of public documents and violation of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.

Purugganan was dismissed from government service by the Office of the President for the same case, the Ombudsman said.

Aside from Purugganan, others to be charged are assistant regional director Edilberto Carabbacan, legal officer Alberto Tremor, acting division chief Juliet Anosan, cashier Evelyn Picardal, project engineer Cristobal Tinaza and engineer Christian Felix Kanongkong.

Also to be charged are private surveyor Primo Menzi, La Trinidad municipal assessor Eduardo Abastilla and Benguet assistant provincial assessor Sambrano Soriano.

In a statement Friday, Morales said the 10 accused were allegedly responsible for the disbursement of P2,557,200 “based on the fictitious and anomalous road right-of-way claims of Antero Palaci and Gertrude Ingosan.”

“Every single document that purportedly supported the claims of Palaci and Ingosan exposes the anomalies being orchestrated by the signatories,” she said in her resolution.

The right-of-way claims were filed in 2001 claiming that private properties were affected by the DPWH’s road improvement project along the Pico-Lamtang Road in La Trinidad, Benguet, in 1997.

In 2003, the Commission on Audit-CAR discovered that the claims were the “products of forgery” and the properties were not affected by the project.

One of the claimants, Ingosan, was already dead at the time the claim was made and her heirs did not receive any payments, it said.—Dona Z. Pazzibugan